Jordi Bernet

Jordi Bernet Cusso

(b. 14 June 1944, Spain)

Torpedo

Jordi Bernet Cussó was born in Barcelona into an artistic family. His father was comic artist Miguel Bernet (alias Jorge), and his uncles were illustrator Juan Bernet Toledano and writer Miguel Cussó. He grew up surrounded by artists from the Bruguera school, such as Peñarroya and Cifré, while developping a passion for the work of American artists like Caniff, Alex Raymond and Hal Foster.

He published his first drawings at age thirteen or fourteen in the magazine Pepe Cola, of which his father was a collaborator. His actual debut came at age fifteen, when he took over the humorous series 'Dona Urraca' in Pulgarcito from his father, who died in 1960. Jordi developed a realistic drawing style from 1962, when he assisted Jordi Buxadé on the western comic books starring 'Jim Huracán', that were published by Toray. He also started taking assignments from British, Italian and US publishers through the Bardon Art agency. One of the comics he drew during this period was 'Poncho Yucatán', that was written by his uncle Miguel Cussó, in 1963. Between 1964 an 1967 he was also a regular contributor of war, historical and fantasy stories for British comic books like Victor, The Hornet, Smash and Tiger.

Paul Foran

With only his first name as a pseudonym, he illustrated two series in Spirou magazine between 1968 and 1976, at first 'Dan Lacombe' with Cusso as scenarist and then 'Paul Foran' with scenarist José Larraz. Bernet and Cusso also cooperated on comics for the German market, such as 'Wat 69' in the erotic humor magazine Pip (1971) and the science-fiction serial 'Andrax' in the Kauka publication Primo (1973). In the second half of the 1970s he alternatd with José Ortiz on the artwork of the German martial arts comic 'El Cuervo' for the Bastei Verlag comic Kung-Fu, through Selecciones Ilustradas.

3 Uomini e un Biberon (L'Eternauta #71, 1989)

After a disagreement with Dupuis and after the fall of the Franco regime, he started to focus on the Spanish market, and especially the adult comic magazines Creepy, Metropol, Cimoc and Comix International. It was not until 1982, that he made his claim to fame by taking over the dark humorous series 'Torpedo 1936' from Alex Toth in the Spanish Creepy magazine. The series was written by Enrique Sánchez Abulí, with whom Bernet had already cooperated on a series of short stories for Makoki that were collected in the book 'Historietas Negras'. 'Torpedo' has been awarded at the Angoulême Comics Festival and got its own magazine, Luca Torelli es Torpedo, in 1992. Later collaborations with Abulí include 'De vuelta a casa' (Zona 84, 1984), 'La naturaleza de la bestia: Ab Irato' (Totem, 1988), and 'Snake: por un puñado de dolares' for the French magazine L'Écho des Savanes in 1996.

With writer Antonio Segura, he created the amazone fantasy series 'Sarvan' in Cimoc in 1984 and the futuristic thriller 'Kraken' in Metropol in 1983. Bernet has also worked extensively with Carlos Trillo. The created the naughty 'Clara de Noche' (El Jueves, 1993), the sexually explicit series 'Cicca Dum-Dum' for Penthouse Comix in 1998 and one-shots like 'Light and Bold', 'Custer' (Zona 84, 1985) and 'Ivanpiire' (Splatter, 1989). The humorous adventures of the prostitute run in El Jueves until this day, by now written by Maicas.

Mississippi River

Bernet has proven himself to be one of the masters of realistic comics, and has developed a very personal, fast and expressive style. In more recent years, he has been working for the Italian western series 'Tex Willer' ('L'uomo di Atlanta' with Claudio Nizzi), but also for US comic books. After a 'Batman' story with Howard Chaykin in 1996, he has been drawing for DC's 'Jonah Hex' title in cooperation with Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray since 2006.